UCC celebrates extravagant welcome through 'Each One Bring One Sunday' during Mission: 1

Building on the success of last year's Friend-Raising Weekend, the UCC
will hold "Each One Bring One Sunday", Nov. 6, 2011, where UCC members are
asked to invite friends and family to join them for worship.

"Once again, we are asking our congregations to get excited to reach out
and invite others to worship with them at church," says the Rev. Felix Carrión,
coordinator of the UCC's Stillspeaking Ministry. "By celebrating this Sunday
together, the hope is that this special effort will become a practice throughout
the year. We hope churches will recognize that welcome and hospitality is a
ministry in itself."

"Each One Bring One
Sunday" falls during "Mission: 1," the UCC's 11-day campaign to raise
awareness and aid to combat food-related injustice. During "Mission: 1," Nov.
1-11, churches will donate 1 million healthy food items to local pantries;
raise $111,111 for national food-related justice ministries and $111,111 for
East Africa famine relief; and send 11,111 letters about food-related justice
to Congress as part of Bread for the World's "Offering of Letters" campaign.

"What a great
opportunity for our churches to show their involvement in local, national and
global ministry to visitors they've invited to worship," says Carrión.

Research suggests
that three out of four people attend a church for the first time because they
were invited. However, less than two percent of church members will ever invite
someone to church. If only 10 percent of the more than 1.1 million UCC members bring
a friend to church Nov. 6, some 110,000 additional visitors will be welcomed in
church that day.

"This is an occasion to join together in a purposeful effort to share
the gift of extravagant welcome," Carrión says. "We need to be intentional,
consistent and excited about invitation."